Want to help Lonely Planet?

Do you like my shiny new badge? (It’s over there =>, in case you’ve missed it). My blog’s been featured on the Lonely Planet website for quite a while now, which I’m quite chuffed about, and has been quite a big boost to the number of readers I get here, so I’m very grateful to them for the extra publicity they’ve been able to give my little blog.

Anyway, they’ve now been in touch with me to ask for some help in publicising something on their behalf – their new Travellers’ Pulse Panel. Rather than describe it myself, here’s what the LP team have to say about it:

Calling all travellers!

Lonely Planet invites you to join our Travellers’ Pulse Panel!

Our panel is a discussion forum where we engage travellers and listen to what you have to say about travel – where to go, how to plan, and other creative travel ideas. We’ve always got interesting topics up for you to comment on, like our current survey on what you’re looking for when you take a trip to a theme park.

Joining the panel is free and if you’re accepted to be a panelist, we’ll send you a free Lonely Planet 2010 calendar as a gift to welcome you on board! Not only will you get to talk about travel, but we regularly run promotions exclusively for panelists where you can win prizes like Lonely Planet products and Amazon gift cards.

If you’d like to join this panel (numbers are limited) all you need to do is click the link below and take a short survey to register. We’ll look at your responses and depending on your age, travel experience and country of residence you might be one of the people we’re looking for! The type of people we need on the panel changes from time to time, so if you aren’t suitable for our panel this time we may contact you to participate in future.

https://www.travellerspulse.com/R.aspx?a=56&Source=BLOG

Thanks again!

Regards,

The Lonely Planet Travellers’ Pulse team

So there you have it. A chance to help pass your thoughts onto Lonely Planet, and the chance to win some prizes. If you do – do let me know what the calendar’s like.

£14 to fly to Paradise

I was going to fly straight to El Nido in Palawan, but 6,000 pesos was a little steep – and then someone pointed out that it was only 995 pesos (about 15 quid) to fly to the island of Busuanga, just to the north of Palawan, and that made the decision for me.

I hadn’t planned to stop in Busuanga, but with flights so cheap it made sense, especially as it gave me the chance to try out some of the finest wreck diving in the world. For on one night in 1944, the US Air Force sank a huge fleet of Japanese ships that were sheltering in and around Coron Bay. Sixty years later, many of them are in relatively shallow, diveable water, and they’re the main attraction for those visiting the island.

Coron Town

Some other people I’d met told me that Coron Town was a bit of a dump – but I loved it. It’s certainly not going to win any architectural awards, but I loved its sleepy, ramshackle nature, and in particular the line of wooden shacks on stilts that jut out from the land into the bay. Quite a few of these operate as cheap hotels, and so I found myself sleeping in a hut right over the beautiful bay – for a mere 4 quid a night. Which is a bit of a bargain when you think how much that sort of thing would cost in somewhere like Tahiti (although admittedly with probably a tad more luxury).

The path to my hut

The morning after arriving I was up early to head out on a boat to dive two of the wrecks, the East Tangat wreck and the Olympia Maru, both of which were Japanese support ships, in around thirty metres of water. I’d already tried out wreck diving at the USS Liberty in Tulamben, Bali, but the reason I was so excited about these dives was the chance to actually penetrate the interior of the ships themselves.

On going in I was suddenly worried I wouldn’t get to see anything after all – I had a slight cold, and for the first time ever I had difficulty equalising the pressure in my ears – which would rule out going any deeper. For a few minutes I had to hover at around three metres while I tried and tried again, and then finally, luckily, I managed it. Panic over and I soon joined the others on the bottom as we headed towards the wrecks.

The outside of the wrecks were OK – there were a fair few fishes around, and lots of sponges and fans – but it was going inside that was the real fun. It was certainly the trickiest diving I’d ever done, as some of the entrances were pretty narrow, and it’s crucial to maintain good buoyancy control to ensure you don’t end up catching yourself on the edges. This is doubly hard because it’s quite difficult to perceive how much higher the tanks on your back extend – as well as to keep your legs level to stop them from catching at the back. I did OK, although a couple of times I got a little stuck, and I ended up scratching my legs a little on one of the narrower entrances. Luckily there were no deadly sharks in the area as I was slightly worried at the effect even a small amount of blood could have on any in the neighbourhood!

Difficulty aside, it was great fun, a bit like being in an underwater assault course, and it was cool getting to see things like the propeller shafts and the huge old engines. I can’t see myself ever becoming an obsessive wreck diver – I prefer the colours of the reefs and the large numbers of fish, as well as the freedom of movement – but I’m glad I did it and would recommend it to any divers traveling in the Philippines (especially as I understand the only place with a bigger collection of diveable wrecks is Truk in Micronesia, which is much harder to get to.
I would have loved to have spent a little more time in Busuanga, particularly to give the island hopping a go (which is supposed to be pretty spectacular), but sadly the boat schedule to El Nido meant we needed to leave the next day, or risk being stranded for quite a while longer.

Are you bored of my sunset pictures yet?

Never throw your flip flop in a cave

The sun finally emerged from behind the clouds just as we getting ready to leave Banaue for the spectacular three hour journey through the mountains to Sagada, giving us the opportunity I’d been waiting for: the chance to admire the scenery unobstructed by riding on the roof of a jeepney.

The rice terraces of Banaue

The ride was every bit as good as we’d been told, as the road wound its way up out of Banaue (and finally getting us the chance to see the town’s rice terraces in all their glory from the viewing point) and through the Cordilleras, passing dozens of beautiful terraces along the way (as well as field of vegetables that looked wonderful thanks to the heart that had been ploughed into its centre). Riding on the roof was pretty fun – but bloody uncomfortable. I won’t be doing that again – not unless I can find a cushion to sit on.

Aw, sweet

Sagada turned out to be a fantastic little village – richly forested, and with pretty houses ranged across the town’s various hills, valleys and atop cliffs. At a slightly lower altitude than Banaue, the climate was perfect too, with glorious blue skies and daytime temperatures that were perfect and without much humidity.

There was one main reason I wanted to visit the village – to see the famous hanging coffins. The people of Sagada have traditionally chosen to place their dead not in the ground, but either inside the many caves that surround the town, or more impressively, by hanging the coffins from the side of some of the huge cliffs in the area.

The Hanging Coffins of Echo Valley

It turned out they were just a short hike behind the church in the centre of the town, down into the valley, to a viewpoint looking right up at the coffins. It’s a truly bizarre sight, and quite impressive – but I must admit at the same time I had a slight tinge of disappointment, as for some reason (I have no idea why) I was expecting to see hundreds of coffins, and not the relative few that we got to see.

A rather unexpected highlight came the next day – I’d heard there were burial caves in town, but as we signed up for a tour, we had no idea what to expect. A half hour walk from the centre of the village took us down to the entrance of a huge cave, which was stacked up with dozens more burial coffins. That was impressive enough, but the best was yet to come.

The guides lead us deeper and deeper into the cave, leading us very carefully through narrow passages, and making us squeeze through some very tight holes as we headed down into the lower caverns. Some of these drops involved some fixed ropes, others required some quite nifty footwork to make our way down – but the whole way the guides were wonderful at making sure we never put a foot wrong.

Quite a tight squeeze

Inside the cave was spectacular – we got to see some massive caverns full of bats, loads of impressive rock formations like stalactites and calcified waterfalls – and the whole process of walking through was pretty fun too, as we switched between tighter passages to wading through pools of water, which caused a few problems for one of our group – instructed to walk barefoot, to get a better grip on slippery rocks, we were told to throw our flip flops to the other end of the cave. Matt threw just a little too hard, and they ended up soaring past the intended landing place, and straight down a vertical drop, never to be seen again.

Weird rock formation inside the cave

Eventually we reached the lowest point, a weird landscape of strangely shaped rocks and beautiful pools, and it was time to head back up – and emerge from an entirely separate cave from the one we’d entered through. We were underground for nearly four hours in total, and it was fantastic fun – I shall definitely be looking out for more caving tours in future.

Emerging into daylight

You can see all of my photos of Sagada here.

My travels in 2009

2009 was a pretty good year for me as far as travelling is concerned – I managed to spend 289 nights outside the UK, and visited 17 countries (beating the 8 I went to in 2008, my previous best). I’ll save a full round-up until I finish my round the world trip in March, but for now here’s a nice little montage of my favourite photo from almost every country I visited in 2009, kindly created for me by Matt.

Featured photos (from top to bottom left to right) are:
UK – London in the Snow (January)
France – Skiing in Les Arcs (March)
Guatemala – Indigenous woman on the streets of Antigua (May)
USA – Art Deco Miami (June)
Bolivia – The Salar de Uyuni (September)
Australia – Kata Tjuta at sunset (November)
Peru – Sunrise over the Cordillera Huayhuash (August)
Chile – Grafitti in Valparaiso (October)
New Zealand – Jumping on the Tongariro Crossing (October)
East Timor – Beware the crocodiles on Baucau beach (December)
Belgium – Antwerp Docks (February)
Mexico – Mazatlan beach (March)
Honduras – Utila beach (June)
Colombia – Fruit sellers in Cartagena (July)
Easter Island – Moai (October)
Indonesia – Sunset over Senggigi beach, Lombok (December)

The only countries missing are Norway (from January, where I forgot my camera), Argentina (from October, where my camera was broken), and Switzerland (from March, which was just a brief stopover on my way to France).

Sadly I won’t be doing quite so much travelling in 2010 – but with Singapore, Thailand, Cambodia, Burma & France to come, as well as the Philippines (where I am now) and Malaysia (where I was earlier this month) there’s still lots to look forward to. Stay tuned for further installments – and click here if you want a look back at any more of my photos.

The stunning rice terraces of Batad

It’s never a nice surprise to arrive in a new town, bleary-eyed after a restless night on a bus, to find it pouring with rain.

“Isn’t it supposed to be the dry season in January?”

“Dry season? Ha ha. No. That doesn’t start here til March”

Serves me right for trusting the Lonely Planet when it comes to planning for the weather. For it turns out that yes, while the dry season starts in January in most of the Philippines, high up in the Cordillera Mountains of North Luzon it’s a different matter. Which was a bit of a problem. We’d made the epic journey up north for one main reason: to see the spectacular 2,000 year old rice terraces of the Ifugao people – and looking out of the hotel balcony, we couldn’t see a thing, as the entire valley was shrouded in cloud.

On arriving in Banaue I’d met up with an English / Ecuadorean couple (Matt & Carolina) and a German (Dominic) and we quickly abandoned our plans to go up to the viewing point over the town. The view would be even worse there. So instead we donned our raincoats and headed out for a wander around the valley in the hope we might actually get to see something. After a while the cloud lifted a little bit, but unfortunately the rain just got heavier and heavier (which is no fun at all when you’re walking along a very muddy unpaved road) so we had to admit defeat and turn back before we’d seen anything but a few smaller terraces.

Rice Terraces close-up

We’d only planned to stay two nights in the area before heading on to Sagada, so despite the weather we optimistically booked ourselves on to a trek for the following day.

The following morning only offered a slight improvement – the clouds were a smidgen higher, but the light drizzle continued. It was our only chance to see the terraces, so we jumped into the Jeepney for the bumpy one hour ride down the road praying for miracles. The weather continued in the same vein throughout the first section of the walk, down very steep, slippery steps and along yet another muddy path as we headed to our ultimate destination – the village of Batad.

We weren’t all that hopeful about our prospects of a good view, but as soon as we came round the corner and saw the village’s rice terraces in all their glory, suddenly the weather didn’t matter any more. For even with grey skies and persistent rain, the sight was spectacular. The guidebook describes them as looking like an amphitheater surrounding the village, and that’s pretty accurate – they rise high up the hillsides in a semicircle all the way round the village, and continue down the valley below as well. As we were there just before the new planting season, every terrace was full fo water – and as they completely surround the village, from our viewpoint above it made Batad look like an island.

The Batad amphitheatre

Trying not to fall in

An island in the mountains

The hike then took us out onto the terraces themselves, walking right along the narrow dividing walls The sight alone is impressive and beautiful enough – but it’s also quite incredible to think that they were carved straight out of the steep mountainsides, at over 2,000 metres, such a long time ago – and not just in Batad, but over a huge area (apparently laid out end to end they’re stretch the whole way round the world several times).

Rainbow over the rice terraces

It’s one of the most beautiful sights I’ve seen on my trip so far – and pretty unexpected too. If I knew anything about the Philippines, it’s as a destination for beaches and diving. I really wasn’t expecting such stunning mountain scenery. Just four days into my stay in the country and I was already falling in love with the place.

You can see all of my photos of the rice terraces here

Manila made me a mallrat

Mallrats is one of my favourite films ever, mainly because it’s pretty damn funny, but also because it gives an insight into one of the those baffling American pastimes that mean little to a Brit like me – I mean, I couldn’t imagine why anyone would you want to spend all their time hanging around in a shopping mall?

Until I got to Manila. I’d already read it in the guidebook, but it wasn’t til I got my bus in from the airport that I realised quite how many malls there are in the city. There must be dozens. And some of them are huuuuuge – the biggest (the Mall of Asia) is apparently the third largest in the world.

I had no intention of spending any time in them, but on my first day I needed to pop in to the local one to get money out. After wandering around town a bit getting my bearings, I soon found myself sucked back in to get a snack (after all, they had a much bigger selection of food outlets than anywhere nearby). I don’t think I’ve ever been to a mall twice in one day before. I resolved to be more adventurous on day two.

Colonial building in Intramuros

I headed out the next morning to take a walk down to Intramuros, the old walled part of Manila. As it happened, the mall was on my way so I popped in for some breakfast (and my first taste of Filipino sausages: mmm). So much for trying to avoid the Mall. Anyway, I headed down to see some history, which took all of a couple of hours – I had no idea Manila had such a tragic recent history, as it was one of the world’s most badly damaged cities in World War Two, as the Americans and Japanese pretty much razed the city in 1945, killing over 150,000 people in the process. This tragic episode has left little of what was once one of Asia’s most beautiful cities. The huge protective walls are pretty impressive, and there are some nicely restored colonial houses, and even the World Heritage listed San Agustin church (nice as it was though, I’m not entirely sure why).

San Agustin Church

Fort Santiago

On the way back I found myself wandering into the mall without quite realising I was doing it, and for no apparent reason. Still, while I was there I popped into M&S for a quick look (just to see if it was exactly the same as back home – it was) and a coffee before heading back to the hostel, where I bumped into the people I’d met the night before, and soon found myself heading straight back to the mall (it turns out – of course! – that the nearest supermarket was located there) to buy some dinner to cook in the hostel. Three times in one day. What was happening to me?

On day three we had some time to kill before catching the nightbus up to the mountains, so we decided to have a bit of a jeepney adventure. Jeepneys are very much the typical Filipino means of transport – they were originally converted US army jeeps, but are now made in the Philippines, and have to be my favourite method of local transportation I’ve encountered yet, as they are painted in bright colours, covered in stickers, and plastered with various slogans (I’m such a fan there’ll be a separate post on Jeepneys coming up). We thought they looked pretty fun, and so we decided to just jump on one and see where it went – which turned out to be chinatown, which is full of your typically hectic asian market stalls (many of which were playing exactly the same ultra-violent chinese film, which people were glued to). Still, it was mostly tat, so after a bit of a wander, one of the girls needed the toilet so we soon found ourselves – where else, but the local mall.

Riding a Jeepney

Despite our best efforts to be in and out in five minutes, we soon found ourselves sucked in, trying out the local empanadas (very nice, but not a patch on Argentina’s), munching on chocolate doughnuts, and shooting hoops at the local arcade’s basketball game.

In the end I had to face up to it: I’d turned into a mallrat myself. And you know what? It turned out to be a lot of fun.

Indonesia Budget & Other Numbers

My wallet was looking forward to getting to Asia, as everyone had told me it was even cheaper than Latin America. And, I didn’t do too badly – food & drink were the cheapest since Bolivia, and accommodation was the cheapest yet. Or rather I should say, I didn’t do too badly as long as I stayed on the ground. Because my (inevitable) overspend was down to two things: one was flying between islands, and the other was the nine dives I did. One was pretty essential (ferry timetables aren’t always that helpful) and the other I wouldn’t have missed for the world.

The other big expense was that I treated myself to a brand new pair of (real, not fake) boardshorts to replaces the ones I bought in Miami and which are already a bit frayed from daily wear. They were particularly nice, if I do say myself. So nice in fact, that after just three hours of wear I hung them out to dry, from where they were promptly nicked while I popped out for a drink. At over $20 an hour of use, it was one more big expense I could have done without.

It’s looking more and more likely now that I’m going to overshoot on budget for the year – although it’s still only marginally. Here’s how the daily averages looked:
Transport: $10.66
Accommodation: $5.56
Activities: $14.88
Misc & purchases: $5.39
Food & drink: $18.44
Total: $54.94

In the seven months of travelling before Indonesia, I’d met a grand total of one Swede. That all change in Indonesia – the place is FULL of them. In fact, the 23 Swedes I met is the biggest concentration of people from one country since the 21 Americans I met in Guatemala. Bizarre. The total is enough to shoot them straight up into joint eighth place in the list of where people I’ve met are from, alongside the Dutch, who were nearly as ubiquitous in the country. The only new country added to this list in Indonesia was Hungary.

Sweden:23
UK: 20
Netherlands: 15
Australians: 14
Indonesia: 13
Germany: 8
USA: 8
Canada: 5
Finland: 4
France: 4
Switzerland: 4
Belgium: 3
Spain: 3
Saudi Arabia: 1
Brazil: 1
Hungary: 1
Portugal: 1
Austria: 1
Mexico: 1

And finally onto those other numbers. Being in the world’s largest archipelago was enough to see my island total shoot up. There’s also a new entry on the modes of transport front – after only being on a moped once in my entire life, they became quite a regular feature in Indonesia.
Beds: 21 (including one on a boat and one in a tent)
Cash withdrawals: 16
Phone calls: 10
Postcards: 2
Laundry: 5
Islands: 16
Dives: 11
Beaches: 8
Volcanoes: 3
Museums: 1
Buses: 16
Taxis: 14
Boats: 14
Mopeds: 15
Flights: 3
Kayaks: 1
Jeeps: 1
Cars: 2
Tuk Tuks / Bejaks: 4

Two Months in Indonesia – a Round-up

I planned my round the world trip around spending at least 6 weeks in certain countries rather than trying to rush around and do too much. Out of all the countries in South East Asia, Indonesia was the obvious choice to spend that amount of time in.

But apparently it was just the obvious choice for me. Out of all the places I’ve been so far on my trip, Indonesia was by far the least touristy (apart from one bit that I’ll come onto in a minute). And I find it completely baffling.

Batak Houses on Pulau Samosir, Sumatra

Indonesia is the biggest country in South East Asia, and has the fourth biggest population in the world. It has more volcanoes than any other country in the world, many of which are safe to climb. It’s home to the biggest lizard in the world, it’s one of only two places to see Orang Utans in the wild, and the forests of Sumatra also have the world’s largest flower. It has the best diving and surfing in Asia, and countless perfect beaches. Java has the world’s biggest (and possibly finest) Buddhist temple, as well as many beautiful Hindu shrines. The people are friendly, the food is good, and everything is pretty cheap. And yet most of the country is almost empty of tourists, other than Bali, Lombok & the Gili Islands. It’s as weird as if 95% of the foreign tourists coming to Europe skipped everything apart from Mallorca and Ibiza.

I’m guessing that people are put off by a combination of the natural disasters that have hit, lingering fears over terrorism (although that doesn’t stop them going to Bali) or maybe even the fact that with a country so big, it seems pointless when you only get a rather stingy thirty day visa on arrival.

Lombok Sunset

Still, it’s their loss, because I absolutely loved the country, in fact I ended up spending even longer than planned, with my eventual time there being nearly two months. There really were so many highlights, but I’d have to say that two stand out for me. First is the fact that Indonesia has the best sunsets I have ever seen. I’d never been a big connoisseur of sunsets before this trip, but some of the ones I saw in the Andes converted me. And they were nothing compared to the stunning shows the setting sun put on night after night.

Orang Utans in Sumatra

Best of all though for me was the wildlife. I’ve never been all that obsessed with plants and animals – historic cities, great beaches, and beautiful scenery normally impress me more – but Indonesia changed all that. I was utterly gobsmacked by what I’ve seen the last two months, including Komodo Dragons, Orang Utans, Manta Rays, huge Turtles and dozens of Reef Sharks, as well as various species of cheekly little monkeys. It’s given me a new-found appreciation of nature and it’s made me rethink some of my future travel plans to do more of that sort of travel in future.

It’s been a bit of a constant theme of these country round-ups that the locals are very friendly, but I have to say that I think the Indonesians have been the best yet. On several occasions I found myself wandering down the street only to find a local strike up a conversation – now this kind of behaviour instantly gets my traveller guard up in case they’re trying to sell me something, but more often than not they just start chatting because they want to talk to you and are interested in where you come from and what you think of their country. My only regret is that I didn’t make more of an effort to learn more Bahasa Indonesia (especially as it’s probably the easiest language to learn in Asia, with its simple grammar and lack of tones), as it really would have enriched the experience even more.

I just wish I’d had even more time there – Sumatra and Flores in particular were beautiful, and I only had a few days in each, due to having to rush before my visas expired, and I’d love to return to see more of them. I had planned to go to Sumba too, but Christmas got in the way, and so I never got to see one of the best-preserved traditional cultures in the country. And I didn’t even get to touch the northern chain of islands – Borneo, Sulawesi, Malaku & Papua – all of which sound fascinating and which I definitely want to return to some day.

So if you’re reading this and planning a trip to Bali – please think about seeing a bit more of the country. Bali is nice enough, but there’s really not much you can see or do there that you can’t see even better, even more cheaply, and without the crowds elsewhere in the country. Plus there’s so much more besides that you could never get to see in Bali alone.

Next stop is the Philippines, which I’m pleased to hear is also pretty uncrowded compared to the rest of South East Asia. I fear that Thailand & Cambodia, my probable final stops, will come as a bit of a shock to the system after this.

You can see all of my Indonesian photos here, and you can read all my Indonesian blog posts here

I wanna hold your (furry) hand

Lake Toba was a pretty lovely place to spend a couple of days chilling out, but I was really only in Sumatra for one reason: Orang Utans.

A couple of hours north of sprawling (and not particularly exciting) Medan is the tiny little village of Bukit Lawang. It’s a charming little place, but it’s not the village everyone comes to see. Sumatra is one of only two places in the world (the other being Borneo) where Orang Utans still live in the wild. Just outside the village is a national park that protects both the rainforest and the animals that live there; on the edge of it is an Orang Utan rehabilitation centre that has been so succesful that the park can take no more of the animals, with the result that a second centre has been opened up elsewhere.

With that many Orang Utans living so close to the village, it’s no surprise that a steady stream of tourists head to Bukit Lawang to trek into the jungle to see them up close (although with this being Indonesia, that stream of tourists is more like a trickle compared to the flood that would visit if it were in most other South East Asian countries).

First monkey of the day

So at eight thirty in the morning, I met up with our guide, Alex, and the group of seven others I’d be trekking with – unusually for Indonesia, they were all English. It took us just a few minutes from the hotel to make it into the jungle, and in no time at all we came across our first close contact with some apes – a troop of Thomas Leaf Monkeys. They weren’t shy at all, and the adult male of the group came down from the trees to have a good look at us (and pose for photos), whilst the kids crashed around the trees above, chasing each other round, swinging from vine to vine and performing rather impressive leaps from tree to tree. Being a young monkey looks like a lot of fun.

It was a nice way to start the day, but we all knew we were there for one reason only, and so we soon moved on to try and find some Orang-Utans. Soon we came across another group standing at the bottom of a tree in silence staring straight up – and we quickly realised what the spectacle was. Perched right at the top of a tree was an adult female Orang Utan in her nest, while her child swung around the tree-tops above her. Exciting as it was to see one, she was so high up, with the sun directly behind her, that it was pretty hard to get a good view.

Getting close to Mina

The day continued in a similar vein, with regular glimpses high up in trees, often obscured by branches, and moving away as soon as we approached. Trying to spot wild animals is always going to be tricky, but it was pretty frustrating all the same. Our luck was about to turn though: as we sat down to have lunch, another group came running past us, as they were trying to get away from the notorious Mina. We’d heard all about her – before she was in the rehabilitation centre, she had lived with humans and had no fear of them. In fact, we had more to fear from her, as she knows humans normally carry food, and she can be quite aggressive in her pursuit of it. So we quickly finished our meals and headed in the direction she was supposed to be, and soon found her. She made a beeline for our guide, who managed to placate her by feeding her bananas one at a time, but as soon as they ran out she started heading straight for us, forcing us to make a quick exit down a steep hill to escape. While they may be shorter in height than humans, they are heavier, and much, much stronger, so it’s really not a good idea to get on the wrong side of one.

With all the excitement over, we headed back down the hill, down some waterfalls, to our camp by the river, with all of us on a real high from getting to see an Orang Utan so close up. We had no idea the best was yet to come.

Jackie

Soon after we made camp, we were all sitting around drinking tea, when Alex pointed out that another semi-wild female, Jackie, was heading down the waterfall and in our direction. She soon made it over to us, and perched on a short little tree just a metre away from where we were sitting, with her adorable little baby (with a cool little Mohican) hanging off her side.

She sat there for a good half hour checking us out, before coming down from the tree and holding the hands of the two nearest people from our group, Helen & Sheri. I really hadn’t expected to get quite so close to an Orang-Utan, and for the next twenty minutes or so, she sat in the middle of us, at one point even giving Sheri a great big hug (which sounds great, but with her huge size and vicelike grip I think Sheri was quite glad to be released again).

Making her way down from the trees

Hugging Sheri

Getting close

It soon became clear that Jackie is quite a bit smarter than Mina – rather than using aggression to get her way, Jackie lulled us into a false sense of security with her affection, and once our guard was down she made a beeline towards the kitchen tent. The guides managed to stop her just in time, and I ended up holding her hand and walking her back across the rover and away from the camp while one of the guides tempted her with some bananas.

Getting ready to walk her away from the camp

She knew she was on to a good thing with us, because as we woke up the next morning she was back in the tree above camp, and soon came down again to get close to us. This time chaos ensued. A troupe of long-tailed macaques had decided to take advantage of our distraction by sneaking round the kitchen tent from the back to try and get at the food, and as soon as we realised what they were up to we stopped watching Jackie for a second and she was off – straight into another tent where she had clearly sniffed out our fruit supplies. In no time at all she’d nabbed all our bananas, oranges and lychees (as well as Helen’s breakfast) and was back up in a tree just out of our reach munching away at her prize.

A Macaque takes advantage of the chaos to steal some toast

We were all pretty speechless. I’d come along on the trek hoping to see the Orang Utans, but I had no idea I’d be able to get so close to one as to be able to hold her hand. They are such beautiful creatures, so human-looking in some of their actions and facial expressions, and clearly very intelligent too. Bukit Lawang had never been on my original itinerary, but I am so glad I made it now. It was my last day in Indonesia after two months, and what a way to go out, as it’s without a doubt one of the best memories of the entire trip to date for me.

You can see all of my photos of the trek here

Cheeky Monkeys & Startled Ladies

After the unavoidable stop in Kuta for Christmas, we had time to escape the madness and explore a bit more of Bali before heading to the Gilis for New Year, and the real must-see was Ubud.

Ubud is one of the many places that I’ve visited on this trip that apparently ‘isn’t what it used to be’ since it was ‘discovered’ and ‘overrun’ by tourists. Funnily enough places that are rather snottily described like that often turn out to be the most fun, and Ubud was no exception.

A rather thorough flea inspection

The town’s main claim to fame is being the centre of traditional Balinese culture (although by day that seems to manifest itself by shop after shop crammed with the same tourist tat, plus an added sprinkling of expat ‘artists’ churning out staggeringly bland and identikit paintings of rice paddies and Balinese temples) but for our first stop we were more interested in some of the other local inhabitants, the rather cheeky little monkeys of the town’s Monkey Forest Sanctuary. It’s just outside the centre of town, and the place is full of Macaques walking straight up to you in the hope of finding food. Despite the fact it’s all pretty touristy, it was great fun. The monkeys are pretty adorable (especially the babies) and when they’re not feeding they seem to spend most of the time sitting around in pairs checking each other for fleas (or, in the case of some of the male ones, engaging in a certain more solitary activity).

If the monkeys were a nice little distraction for an afternoon, the real highlight of our stay in Ubud was getting to see some traditional Balinese dancing. One evening we made our way up to Ubud Palace to watch a performance, and it was really quite incredible. It takes years to train to be a professional dancer, and you can clearly see why. The elegance of the different poses they strike is quite beautiful, and the various traditional forms that they gracefully and seemingly effortlessly hold themselves in – particularly the way the hands are constantly folded right back, far further than any normal person can manage – is amazing.

There’s just one aspect of it all that I find a little bizarre – it’s the way the female dancers spend most of the time with their eyes as wide open as they can, with eyebrows raised, that makes it look like they spend most of their time looking rather startled.